Chapter Text
The clock in her office felt like it was staring mockingly at Dani. She grimaced as she found her hand gravitating towards her phone again. This was going to be the twelfth time in the last 2 hours that she'd read and re-read the same text.
A simple line telling her good night with a smiley emoji shouldn't be needing such in-depth analysis. But the timestamp on the message was bothering her. It had been sent just last night, quite late and past her usual bedtime. It was the tail end of a very long thread of replies between herself and Gigi over various topics before it got late enough for bed. Dani pondered anxiously if sending another text this afternoon was too much. And even worse, sending a text asking Gigi to hang out for the 3rd time this week. They had dinner on Monday night, which was the quietest night of the week for restaurants(and secretly Dani's favourite night to go out), and met for a quick coffee break on Wednesday when Gigi had gone to see a listing near the Núñez office headquarters.
Dani steeled her resolve and began typing. "Want to go out for a drink?". Nope nope nope, she deleted that in case it sounded too much like she's asking for a date. "Are you free tonight?". She rapidly deleted the draft message again. It somehow seemed even worse than the previous message.
Across town, Gigi has opened the same message trail to re-read over the funny and sweet messages exchanged between herself and Dani last night, and stifled a laugh. She sees the "..." appear and disappear indicating that Dani is rapidly typing and retyping whatever message she planned to send. This goes on for the next 10 minutes and Gigi knew what was coming next. She turned back to her laptop to continue working before the expected interruption arrived. The phone rings and she picks it up without checking the name. She's learnt over the past few weeks that Dani tends to go right into phone call instead of texting when she thinks she wants to deliver a message that's more efficient than endless texts. It broke the rule of modern etiquette to text before calling, but Dani's impatience for inefficiency was endearing.
"Hey, boss lady."
Dani felt warmth spreading through her body just at Gigi's voice.
"Hey! I was just wondering if you're still in the office."
"Sure am. What's up?"
"I'm heading to a little business mixer near where you are, just a small networking thing with other businesses we work with, and I uh... if you're not busy..."
Dani forced herself to slow down a bit. In her mind, she imagined Gigi smirking at her on the other side of the line.
"If you're not busy, it'll be really nice if you could come."
Gigi smiled at the sincere tone. "Of course, let me just finish up here then I'll meet you there in an hour?"
Dani grinned and suddenly felt like she was looking forward to the usually boring business mixer. "Sounds perfect, see you soon."
Dani tried to keep her focus on the discussion between the gaggle of businessmen, most of them old and white, standing in front of her, all trying to sell some pitch to Núñez Inc. She nodded and replied at all the right times, while subtly stealing glances at her watch. She didn't want to be that crazy fool who wondered if "an hour" meant exactly "1 hour", or precisely "60 minutes". Her call to Gigi that afternoon had ended at 5:45pm, so her mind had set 6:45pm as the time that Gigi was likely to arrive, give or take a few minutes.
She forced herself to not be anxious at the thought of Gigi arriving much later, or not turning up at all. Sophie rarely ever agreed to accompany her to events like this, and even in the times she did turn up, she was always late by more than 2 hours, and would hiss under her breath to Dani about how boring it all was. She had been mortified to notice that her father's business associates had overheard Sophie more than once, and it already made her sticking out like a sore thumb as the sole woman and openly gay member of the executive team an even more difficult ordeal than it already was.
She glanced at her watch again. It was 6:31pm. She tried to suppress the urge to overthink and turned her attention back to the discussion at hand. She was in the middle of explaining some of the nuances behind the company's latest quarterly results when she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. A smile came unbidden to her face on seeing "Golnar" flash on her screen. It was 6:35pm. It was just like Gigi to make the effort to arrive a little early, knowing how Dani felt about these things.
"Excuse me, gentlemen. I must take this call."
The men nod politely, and Dani walked a little bit away from them to take the call.
"Hello?"
"Hey there, I've just gone through the entrance but I can't see you. Are you standing near the group of suits near the bar?"
Dani laughed and looked towards the entrance. "You'll need to be more specific, there's literally multiple groups of suits standing near the bar."
She heard an answering laugh behind her and the phone hanging up, and spins around to see Gigi. Dani's breath catches a little in her throat as it does every time she sees her. Gigi is wearing what may seem like regular work attire to anybody: just a simple white, button-up shirt under a dark blazer, matching skirt, heels, and her usual gold necklaces and earrings, but Dani felt like she was looking at someone otherworldly in their beauty. That wonderful curly hair, the softest brown eyes that always felt like it was burning right through her, and not to mention those tempting lips smirking at her right now...
"Hey," Gigi said softly as she walked a little closer to Dani.
On seeing Dani still staring and still not saying anything, Gigi reached her hand out to squeeze Dani's arm. "Hey," she says again, while looking into Dani's eyes questioningly.
"Hi," Dani finally replies. It came out a lot more huskier than she had intended, going by how Gigi's eyes widened slightly on hearing it. Dani could feel the tips of her ears burning and almost rushed in to say something else, but felt herself calming down as Gigi squeezed her arm again and gave her a soft smile.
"Wow, this is quite a shindig, you must be having a blast."
Dani laughed and gestured towards the bar. "Yeah, I'm having a great time. Can I get you a free, corporate-sponsored drink?"
They walked toward the bar and Gigi requested to have what she was having. A whiskey on the rocks. They had just received their drinks from the bartender when Dani felt a polite tap on her shoulder. On turning around, she saw representatives from the some of the biggest institutional shareholders in Núñez Inc. Old friends of her parents and of course, all of them a bit on the conservative side.
"Dani! We'd been looking for you all evening. How wonderful to see you here tonight," said one of the oldest men in the group. He glanced at questioningly at Gigi who was standing by Dani's side, and Dani felt herself at a loss on how to introduce her to these fogey, old businessmen. Should she say, "This is my... friend"? "This is my former boss' girlfriend"? "This is the woman I wished was my girlfriend"?
Before she could say anything, Gigi confidently stepped in and held out her hand for the man to shake.
"Hi, I'm Gigi Ghorbani. I own a local real estate firm in the area, and Dani invited me to the mixer. I'm just here to learn from the big guns and the finest minds in business."
Utterly charmed, the old man shook Gigi's hand and beamed a little at her. "Well now, not sure if I'm exactly the best teacher, but you're more than welcome to come to more of these if you'd like."
They fell into an easy conversation regarding commercial and high-end residential real estate, with the others curiously joining in the discussion, and one by one falling for Gigi's wiles. By the end of it, business cards were being pressed into Gigi's palms, with requests for listings and follow ups. It was the same pattern as they moved through different groups for Dani to network and catch up with investors. People would fall like a tonne of bricks for Gigi's easy way of starting and sustaining conversation. Dani was not oblivious to the approving nods being sent her way, even from the fogey old men, who like Rodolfo, had found subtle ways to criticize her "lifestyle" when it had come out that she was a lesbian. She found herself blushing, knowing that Gigi wasn't her girlfriend, but the way they had been standing closely together all night had made it seem so, and neither herself or Gigi had made an effort to correct anyone's assumptions.
As the event drew to a close and everyone started shuffling off to the exits, Gigi turned towards her. "I'm not saying this just because of the free drinks, but I had a good time."
Dani smiled and gestured towards Gigi's purse which was practically bursting with business cards. "Looks like your rolodex is going to be having a good time tomorrow too."
"Rolodex? How vintage of you, I bet you own a pager as well."
Dani's eyes crinkled with laughter. She hadn't expected for a work event to actually be relatively painless for once. But with Gigi around, it felt almost effortless and fun.
Gigi finished her last drink, took the empty glass in Dani's hand and gestured towards the bar. "I'm just going to drop these off with the bartender, then I'll be ready to go. Want to go for a late dinner at that place we went to last Friday? You must be starving by now."
Dani smiled gratefully. "Yeah, that sounds great actually."
As Gigi walked away from her and towards the bar, Dani felt a hand on her shoulder and turned around to find Mateo, her father's oldest friend and former business partner back from when they had first started. Mateo had sold his shares long ago, and moved on to being a board member at other companies, but he still kept in close touch with the Núñezes. The last time Dani had seen him was... at the failed wedding.
Dani cringed internally as she waited for Mateo to speak. She had remembered as a child how he had seemed like such an imposing figure. He made Rodolfo seemed soft in comparison. He hadn't exactly told her in words how disappointed he'd been to see her grow from a reserved, young girl to a lesbian stubbornly flaunting her lifestyle in front of everyone's faces, but the way he had spoken less and less to her as time went on felt like an even worse disapproval of sorts. She shuddered to think what he thought of her now after she had been humiliated at the altar. In fact, many in this room had borne witness to her being being so publicly shamed. She felt herself shrinking a little at remembering again how crushed she had looked in front of everybody.
"Dani... it's good to see you here tonight. I know Rodolfo is struggling with... with a lot right now. But it's good to see you doing what needs to be done."
Dani nodded solemnly. "Thank you, Mateo. I'll send my father your regards."
Mateo patted her on the shoulder and glanced towards the bar where Gigi was returning the whiskey glasses and thanking the bartenders for their service.
"She's wonderful, Dani. It's good to see you're doing well, after everything that's happened."
Dani was too stunned by Mateo's rare show of praise and could only nod dumbly as he smiled and gave her one last pat on the shoulder and shuffled away. She had always assumed he was a homophobe who wanted her to burn in hell after she came out. She thought back again to one of the many conversations she'd had with Gigi, where Gigi had insisted that more people cared about Dani than she thought.
She felt a hand on her elbow, bringing her out of her musings.
"Ready to go?", Gigi asked.
Dani smiled and led her towards the exit, a small feeling of pride growing in her chest again as the remaining suits in the room watched them leave together.